this proposal is the fourth and final version - and it went through quite a few iterations, getting improved with every step. So, please read this - download the final PDF file (v3.0) here and ask, if anything is unclear. Also: Most of the discussion results you see below this post have already been integrated to this updated PDF, so you're all set. Here goes:

I really think that this could have a huge impact - and help not only spreading knowledge of Dash but by putting the allocated budget to good use. We strive to work towards realizing that moment of truth for our customers, when they realize how DASH works and that its long-term benefits largely outweigh the short-sightet benefits that the use of PayPal promises. Well, in essence DASH is the NEW MONEY - and to get more people to use it, I am asking you to please consider voting for us.

Anyway - no matter how this will work out, I owe you and the community a huge thanks. It's seldom you get to work and get feedback from such an awoken, contesting and still friendly and helpful community. I really appreciate all of your feedback – and most of all your warm welcome.

50% of the budget is for promotional pricing to undercut current market rates, so what happens if the campaign isn't successful and you are left with extra funds? Will you keep the lowered Dash price until there is no budget left?

As for your question: We plan to cover AAA products and bestsellers for this promotion. That - including the reach that will be gathered naturally by

the advertisements

our owned-media push by newsletter, social media etc.

the resulting social-media buzz around low priced high quality game offers and

the extended reach by international price comparison pages

to our experience will most definitely force us to the contrary – to limit each day’s spending of funds so that we make it through the full promotional campaign run, which will be one full month.
In short: To the best of our professional knowledge of the market we’re in this campaign should very much fly on its own to be a success.

That said: In the highly unlikely event that there would be extra funds left from the promotional part, we would then extent the lower-priced offers further into the future, until all funds for reducing the prices would be spent.

I didn't see this as it was posted in the Proposal rather than Pre-Proposal section, otherwise I would have gotten to it sooner. This is fairly expensive for an integration, as we've integrated on exchanges that see a lot more traffic for a lot less, but by the same token, this is an ideal use case for the current state of Dash. So what I think it would boil down to would be an informal assessment on the part of MNOs in terms of the cost/benefit ratio of the cost of integration and marketing (560 Dash) vs. increase in Dash transaction count, use of Dash for purchases, etc.

One of the major problems we've seen lately is that it's not enough to simply set up merchants to take Dash for their goods and services, customers need to be incentivized to *spend* Dash. You seem to have largely covered that base with discounts and marketing/education, but there's just no telling whether that will be enough of an incentive to drive usage.

So on that note, one of the major hurdles is that people have to jump through the necessary hoops to acquire Dash in order to expend it, so hopefully you've done enough analysis to ensure that the benefit in using Dash is worth those extra hoops. What is your plan for educating potential Dash users on how to obtain Dash to be spent on your platform? Is there a particular exchange or service (i.e. Uphold, etc) that users are recommended to use in order to obtain Dash?

You made some good remarks there, so I will adress them here, one-by-one:

1) As for the informal assessment on the part of MNOs in terms of the cost/benefit ratio of the cost of integration and marketing (560 Dash) vs. increase in Dash transaction count, use of Dash for purchases, we offer this as an exemplary calculation:
We calculate that with the use of the full budget we would see an increase of first-time-usership of DASH by up to 8000 customers and more. Here is how: From the full campaign budget we use half, which is 280 DASH or 76064,8 US$ at today’s rate. To keep in mind: Our annual overall average basket per user is worth 34 US$. If we were to use that 34 US$ as a calculatory base we would be able to serve 8948 customers with 25% off (i.e. US$ 8.50 discount per basket/user) during the campaign period of one month. With this high a discount our experience with price controlling tells us to limit the amount of eligible DASH purchases to 288 discounted daily baskets of first-time customers paying with DASH.

Keep in mind: This would be the most radical way to price discounts we would offer – and it would definitely make customers aware of DASH – but it’s also costly for each new signup. To get more signups with less discount cost we would a) start with a smaller contingency of 25% discounts – and then offer larger contingencies of second and third tier discounts (e.g. 15% followed by 10% off) once each daily limit has been used. This way we would gain from the positive communicational aspects of offering 25% off – and increase numbers of signups with the second and third tiered discounts each day. In short: More signups, more effective use of discount budget.

2) You say that customers need to be incentivized to *spend* Dash and that we largely covered that base with discounts and marketing/education. Tough you are unsure if that will be enough of an incentive to drive usage.
We got your meaning there. Keeping track of pricing is our daily business, as price simply is THE product criteria that can me most easily be matched. So we do already know that we will be offering some higher discounts – to an extent that this campaign will definitely be picked up by price comparison pages internationally. We do have experience with pricing campaigns – and lowering the prices by offering discounts will definitely have an impact. We also know our target audience pretty well – to the extent that they ARE willing to jump some hoops in order to get new, fresh games for a lower price.

Also I want to point out that there will be regular campaign reports each week – so there is plenty of options for us to interconnect and talk about further developments. As I said in an earlier posting: If - for any reason - there is discount budget left (and we doubt this very much) at the end of the campaign period, we will put this to further discount use in the same manner until it runs out.

3) You ask what our plans are for educating potential Dash users on how to obtain Dash to be spent on your platform – and if there is a particular exchange or service (i.e. Uphold, etc) we would recommended to use in order to obtain Dash?
We will try to educate our customers by several means and several ways. One of them is setting up a Campaign Microsite expaining what this campaign is about, explaining what DASH is and how its Wallet setup works – step-by-step as text and video. Also we would offer to point to several international services as our target group is diverse – they come from the UK (where suggestions could be: Cex.io, Cryptomate, Cryptomonster, Exmo), and Germany (suggestions could be: Coinfinity, Lykke, Coindeal) as well as Spain and France (where we would suggest the use of this URL: https://docs.dash.org/en/latest/introduction/how-to-buy.html). We would regard the customer‘s choice WHERE to purchase DASH over proposing a single service for this campaign.

1 & 2) Ok, sounds reasonable. Has there been any research as to what kind of a discount would be enough of a tipping point to get users to transact in cryptocurrency? Other services in which we've integrated often do a 10-15% discount, but I'm not sure if any research or data is really informing those numbers or if they're sufficient in convincing users on the fence over to our side. So the MNOs will probably want to see some sort of survey or at least data-based reason to believe that whatever you're doing will be successful. Obviously if it bears out in your reports, that's sufficient, but first you have to convince the MNOs to give you the funds in the first place.

3) Great, a micro-site with instructions and demo videos should be sufficient. There are some worthwhile community sites toward which you can also point potential users like http://www.discoverdash.com which not only give in-depth, easy-to-understand instructions about how Dash works and how to use it, but also showcase other merchants and services around the world that accept Dash as payment, so the users know that the Dash they procure is good not only for games on your site, but all sorts of other things as well.

The only other thing I'd mention as a suggestion, is that you might want to break up the payments in to smaller chunks (i.e. 2 months at 280 Dash or whatever). The reason I say this is that the budgets have been exceedingly full and competitive lately, and that much Dash all upfront is roughly 10% of our budget currently, much of which will already be allocated from other multi-month proposals and at least for the next few months our Core Team's development costs. This much is pretty much entirely filled up by last month's carry-over proposals and this month's requests from our Core Team. Next month will probably be similar. With that much Dash, we could fund many other grassroots initiatives or smaller development projects, so to get a project that expensive passed, you'll really have to leverage the value it will bring to the network. Asking for smaller amounts over a longer time period would give you time to start a smaller pilot and test how users react to different discount amounts, etc, but I also understand if the nature of the project requires it all upfront or not at all, just a suggestion based on what I've observed over the years in voting patterns.

it took me a while to compile all this, to please excuse the delay. You discuss two topics there – let me dive just in:

1) You ask if there has been any research as to what kind of a discount would be enough of a tipping point to get users to transact in cryptocurrency? Yes, indeed we did – and already further that reseach.

First of all we analyzed our sales details from the whole of the last year. As the useage of coupon codes in our market is quite common, we have an excellent way of tracking the discounted percentage with payment methods and basket worth. We did analyze these figures before even considering this kind of promotion and tool away several key insights and some takeaways from that:

a) People want to stick to their regular behaviour or – for that matter – to the payment method they are most accustomed to. So, if we want to do that, we will have to incentivize them.

b) Any kind of behavioural change of the customer (which the setup and use of a new payment method would be) has to be induced externally and it has be done so with care and a certain amount of pressure – in this situation the pressure to miss out on a great deal.

But what’s great?

In 2014 one of our German shops with a similarly structured product and customer base introduced a new, quite disruptive payment method: "Barzahlen" which is a Germany-only service that used regular stores and their digital cashier’s desks to accept direct payments to verify online orders. It had to be explained thoroughly to our customers. Not everyone understood these steps: a) Choose that new payment method at checkout b) get a payment code c) go to the drugstore and pay d) receive your purchase.

But in combination with a discount of 20% off on AAA titles as Grand Theft Auto V plus a little guidance in form of a microsite we were able to get our customers there. Acceptance rate was moving up steadily that way – even tough back then PayPal already was the go-to payment service for 61.5% of our customers.

Back then we already did a quite extensive online survey with a sample size of n=10873 customers about this topic with impressive insights about the importance of single features for the payment service. It showed that 62% chose Barzahlen because there simply could not be any fraud, because no bank account data was used anywhere. 16% chose it mainly becasue the lack of a credit card (or because they would have to ask Parents/Friends to use theirs), 12,5% used it mostly for anonymity reasons and 9,5% used it mainly becasue the next payment partner shop was around the corner.

So, nearly a quarter does use crypto currency and thus would be more likely to persuade set-up and use of DASH. In the second tier where we would need a bigger push, there are 45.7% that already have basic knowledge and thus could be helped with step-by-step guidance and offers. In the third tier there are 10.9% of generally curious customers without any knowledge of Crypto Currency. Unfortunately, almost 54% of those who answered this found themselfes either to be unskilled or not very skilled (see #3). Hence we would not target this group because cost of acquisition would be too high.

✋ 2) Some online payment providers like PayPal or credit card companies take a fee as high as 4% from each of your payments! Would you be open to pay with a Crypto Currency to save on these fees in the future?

Yes, of course! It'll save money I can spend elsewhere. (19.6%)

Yes, I would give it a try because I am interested into how it works. (19.6%)

Maybe. It depends on the price of the product I want to purchase. (43.5%)

No, it's OK for them to take those fees. I don't mind. (17.4%)

Our customers like to save money: Nearly 40% say, they would try paying in crypto currency for either saving money or for their own curiousness. A staggering 45.5% would try it depending on the price of the product (and hence the discount we would give them). We would target those 82.7% of our customers – and ditch the 17.4% that think PayPal should have their 4% payment fee for this campaign.

3) Crypto Currencies are stored in digital wallets. They can be accessed by a website or a program on your computer. How technically skilled do you feel when you would be asked to set up one of these wallets and fill it?

Very skilled: I already have done this. (19.6%)

Very skilled: I can do this easily by myself - without any doubt. (15.2%)

Generally skilled: I can manage to register on a website or install stuff on my computer. I'll do fine. 29.3%)

Not very skilled: I would only be able to do this with a detailed step-by-step instruction or a tutorial video. (21.7%)

Unskilled: Even with a step-by-step instruction and tutorial video I will not get this done. (15.2%)

These results are interesting, as we would not only cover with our campaign the skilled group (add #1 and #2 to 39.2%) but also the generally skilled customers (29.3%) AND the group of not very skilled customers that would requiere a detailed step-by-step instruction or a tutorial video (21.7%). All in all our content would cover 90.2 of our survey participants.

4) GamesDeal already offers games at bargain prices. With payment by a Crypto Currency you also save on any payment fee - up to 4%. How likely would you pay with a Crypto Currency if GamesDeal offered you a *very* considerable discount off your initial purchases with it?

Very likely (19.6%)

Likely (34.8%)

Unlikely (23.9%)

Very unlikely (21.7%)

That’s 54.4% of positive to a 45.6% split decision of our users. As before we have three tiers of pressure we need to apply here. First, low pressure and not-too-high (but still considerably-sized) discounts for the Very-likely group (19.6%), a bit more discount for the likely group (34.8%) and few but high discounts to sway some of the unlikely group (23.9%). We reckon the group that answered Very unlikely (21.7%) in view of the promise of „considerable“ discounts would be lost to us due to a suggested extremely high price to turn them into DASH users.

So, you see – we did and do our numbers and they indicate that this will be a useful endeavour.

2) As for you suggesting split payment – I guess we can and will make this work. Seems like also a smart idea in terms to improve chances of getting votes from you guys.

So – please excuse the while it took me to gather all of this – but be sure: You have my thanks for your input and for sharing your knowledge.

As for the proposal: I will rework it to match my above answers and add changes to accomodate for a split-payment today – it should be here by Tuesday.

@Lance Lan -- Thanks for taking the time to thoroughly answer my questions, I believe you've addressed all the potential concerns I have. Now, I am only one of many other MNOs which actively vote, so you may want to allow time for other MNOs to ask questions. It's also a good idea to get involved with our other platforms like our Dash Nation Discord server or our Official Reddit page, as not all community members are active in the same locations.

The other strategic suggestion I was going to offer is to pay close attention to our monthly budget cycles and plan when you intend to submit your proposal carefully. As it stands, our Core Development Team is putting in several proposals for the beginning if the fiscal year to set up their funding moving forward, so as it stands, the current proposal cycle and much of the next proposal cycle are likely to be mostly consumed with their budget requests, so if there are any remaining funds, there will likely be a lot of competition in those cycles. If you can wait for a cycle that is less full and less competitive, your chances improve, but that's just something to keep in mind. If you have any questions about how all of that works, let me know!

I will update the first post of this thread now to exactly match the updated details - upload the updated presentation - so that anyone can see the discussion later on.
I also will post this link to Dash Nation later.

Looking at the amount that you're looking for (560 Dash) and how many users you anticipate to bring on board (8,948 new Dasu users), plus the value of those customers ($34/year customers) I think this is very expensive for too low a return. At your pricing, that's $17/user!

Looking at the amount that you're looking for (560 Dash) and how many users you anticipate to bring on board (8,948 new Dasu users), plus the value of those customers ($34/year customers) I think this is very expensive for too low a return. At your pricing, that's $17/user!

Click to expand...

Something to keep in mind is that these are not merely just clicks or impressions or views or usual KPI, but also an integration moving forward with an active platform, adding to the Dash ecosystem what can be purchased with Dash.

Something to keep in mind is that these are not merely just clicks or impressions or views or usual KPI, but also an integration moving forward with an active platform, adding to the Dash ecosystem what can be purchased with Dash.

Click to expand...

Sure, then it that regard the question should be whether Dash is willing to pay such a high amount for such an intergration or whether to incentivise activations, by say rewarding the platform with X Dash for every new intergration and/or new purchase.

That way, the platform is incentivised to make sure that new users are introduced to Dash and Dash are pleased with the onboarding of new users.

Will there be a guarantee that after such an intergration users will continue to use Dash? What will happen if a new crypto approaches the platform and offers to incentivise new users to their payment method?

thanks for your feedback there - and sorry for let you hang in there for a couple of days. You mentioned several topics in your post, so I would like to tackle each briefly - and dive right in:

The integration of DASH payment on GamesDeal.com has already taken place, but we see little to no activity there – hence the whole proposal.

To limit your suspicions about future crypto currencies being sponsored by us - I can say this: We have a unique bond with DASH on a private level – so I can pretty much rule that out. Sorry that I didn’t put that statement in the proposal as well as it should have been.

As for the cost of onboarding: You surely have read that we agree that general cost of „onboarding“ new DASH users is high. You would then also have read above that (since we fully agree with you on that) we are targeting not only 25% discounts, but a three-tiered discount setup. Let me quote myself here and highlight the areas you might have missed out on:

"We calculate that with the use of the full budget we would see an increase of first-time-usership of DASH by up to 8000 customers and more. Here is how: From the full campaign budget we use half, which is 280 DASH or 76064,8 US$ at today’s rate. To keep in mind: Our annual overall average basket per user is worth 34 US$. If we were to use that 34 US$ as a calculatory base we would be able to serve 8948 customers with 25% off (i.e. US$ 8.50 discount per basket/user) during the campaign period of one month. With this high a discount our experience with price controlling tells us to limit the amount of eligible DASH purchases to 288 discounted daily baskets of first-time customers paying with DASH.

Keep in mind: This would be the most radical way to price discounts we would offer – and it would definitely make customers aware of DASH – but it’s also costly for each new signup. To get more signups with less discount cost we would a) start with a smaller contingency of 25% discounts – and then offer larger contingencies of second and third tier discounts (e.g. 15% followed by 10% off) once each daily limit has been used. This way we would gain from the positive communicational aspects of offering 25% off – and increase numbers of signups with the second and third tiered discounts each day. In short: More signups, more effective use of discount budget."

You might see that this flexible three-tiered discount system (25% off, Tier 2: 15% off, Tier 3: 10% off ) would bring more than the targeted 8948 customers to setup and use DASH. As we use daily budgets and do not have available research data to compare this to, our first day’s spending split would see 20% go to Tier 1, 33% go to Tier 2 and 47% would be taken for Tier 3 discounts. We would check results each day and allocate each day’s spending split to get the most out of the budget.

I hope this explains the idea behind the split: We know it’s expensive to onboard new DASH users, but we not only want to reach those that only go for the biggest discounts, but those who would still accept a lower-priced incentive which would be more easily to get - you could see this as a long tail approach.

I also think you might have mixed up the average annual basket worth (which is 34$ in our case) with „value per customer“ which I would more fittingly attribute to the Customer Lifetime Value. That number would count the benefit that each customer brings during each year as a customer – so I reckon your calculation might be off there.

Anyway – I sincerely hope this explains what we want to achieve and that we strife towards in order to grow the network further.